A/N: Hey! So, this chapter may be a little slow, sorry, it's alot of background. Just bear with me, later on there will be more action-y stuff but I need the background stuff first otherwise it will be confusing. Hope you like it! Reviews and suggestions are always appreciated!

"Katari, focus", My father growled. He was annoyed. But more than that, he was worried. In district 12, it is easy to be distracted. The people are starving. They spend their days mining coal for the capitol, their designated job for the Capitol that we all serve. Each district stuck with its own task, and they had to get stuck with mining coal. A few were lucky. They got to be bakers and apothecaries and other such things. The Capitol did little to help them. No one there really cared for those from 12. They never won the annual Hunger Games and they didn't have a very prestigious job set like the people from districts 1, 2, and 4. They just worked like slaves, doing the capitol's bidding for the most part. A few hunted illegally, but the Capitol didn't mind, as long as they did everything that was demanded of them.

Then again, I am not much better. I live better than most, save the people of the Capitol. My father has trained me for my profession, if you want to call it that. He really had no choice. Everyone in our particular profession must have an heir, but only one. If you refuse, well, you and everyone you love will be tortured to death. But that would take years. So mostly torture. No one knows what we do. We could tell them, but then we would have to kill them. Seriously. It would be more merciful than what our higher-ups would do to them. So, every one of us has to have at least one child to pass on their legacy to. They train them and teach them the rules, then the heir is on their own for their test. And they have to pass that test, or there are some nasty consequences. First, the child is considered a failure, so of course they are tortured and killed in some creative new way. For a first offense, it's not considered a fluke, just that particular heir, and that next time it will be a success. But the second time, the failed heir is killed, the family is killed, and they must start all over.

So what has my father especially on edge? Not that I could die, not that I don't have the skill, but that I would be the second offense. He could lose his entire family over today. I have to pass my test. And you're probably thinking, well maybe you should have studied harder and you wouldn't have a problem. My answer would be that yes I studied. I studied for 16 years. You are probably also thinking, damn, what the hell kind of school kills you for failing a test? Well, in the nation of Panem, which lies in the ruins of what was once called North America, there is a powerful government called the Capitol, a city that is filled with some of the most cruel and devious people ever to live, and also with a ton of vapid, but sadistic people who like to watch kids kill each other. They also worry about parties and the latest, nuttiest fashions. They don't really care about the people in the 12 districts surrounding the Capitol. There were 13 before the rebellion, but the thirteenth was destroyed because it incited the rebellion. The others were just severely punished and, as an added bonus, forced to send two tributes each year, one a girl and one a boy, from each district between the ages of twelve and seventeen to compete in the Hunger Games, a fight to the death where twenty four enter an arena, but only one leaves alive. Then the winner is showered with wealth, fame, yadda yadda. But the thing is, District 13 wasn't destroyed by bombs like the capitol claims. That wouldn't have worked since they were the ones who made the bombs. No, the Capitol of Panem feeds its people these lies because it wants to keep its greatest weapon a secret, the one thing that the people don't realize they are still being punished with. Us.

So, you see, facing a test like this isn't a matter of writing down the right answers. It's not about memorization. It is about deciding wether or not you can take a life, and then spend the rest of your life doing exactly the same thing, because that is what those in my profession do. We didn't choose this life, but we have to live it anyway. We are the Capitol's elite assassins, which is why it keeps so few of us, only up to twenty four at any given time, because we are so lethal. We are the ones they send in when someone has crossed their line, the ones they sent in almost seventy years ago to destroy an entire district.

We are Hunters, and wherever we go, death follows.